The Table of Grace - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this morning.

The last week we were challenged to look at whether we are more interested in our personal convenience or in the costly pursuit of following Jesus no matter what.

Today we’re going to look at Mark 14:12-31. This passage tells us about some lasts; the last night before Jesus would be crucified. It’s the last Passover he would celebrate and it’s the last night He would be with the 12 original disciples together in one place ever.

But it also marks a first; it’s the first time the Lord’s Supper is celebrated.

Let’s read Mark 14:12-31

You’ll notice that this passage is broken into 3 sub plots: the Passover, the Lord’s Supper, and Peter’s denial of his future denial.

I’m drawing your attention to this because it’s an important transition.

It’s no coincidence that God’s plan would include the sacrifice of His only Son to occur during Passover. Everything is in place and the time has come for Jesus to pour out His life and in these two meals we see the symbols of this in vs. 12-26

The shift from the Passover to the Lord’s Supper marks the transfer from the Law of Moses to the gospel of grace and truth; from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant.

John 1:17 For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

The Passover was celebrated in remembrance of God delivering His people from Egyptian bondage and the Lord’s Supper is to be celebrated in remembrance of Jesus delivering all people from the bondage sin.

The Passover was remembered with a meal focused on a sacrificial lamb that was killed and eaten. The Lord’s Supper is a meal to remember the Lamb of God who was slain for our sins.

The Passover brings to remembrance the blood of a lamb that was placed on the lintel and door posts so that death would pass over the people. The Lord’s Supper brings to remembrance the blood of the Lamb, Jesus, which was shed on the posts of a cross to allow people to pass over from death to life.

There’s something else to consider. The Passover meal was to be shared with others and Jesus, on this night shared the meal with others and who He shared it with showed the move from the law to grace.

As Jesus sat with these guys He knew that He’d be dead the next day and even though He had told His disciples 2 or 3 times before hand what was going to happen they still didn’t connect the dots. But that’s not all Jesus knew. He knew that one of the men who sat at the table with Him that night was in the very process of betraying Him and He also knew that everyone else would abandon Him or deny they knew Him before dawn.

Jesus’ heart had to be aching knowing that He would be betrayed by a friend, denied by His followers, and forsaken by His Father. Luke’s gospel tells us that at this very table Jesus had to listen to His disciples argue about who would be the greatest among them.

Do you know what I think is the most amazing thing in this story? Even though His friends were acting like jerks and knowing what they were all going to do before the night was done He still invited them to sit as His table and eat with Him.

The disciples were invited to the table and not one of them was worthy to be there.

We all know that Judas Iscariot betrayed Jesus to the men who would have him put to death. Jesus knew He was doing it and He could have told Him not to show up at dinner. But the same could be said for all of the others. Jesus could have eaten this meal with others who would have stood by Him to the very end. The women who showed up at the cross: His mother Mary, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome to name a few.

But Jesus chooses to eat with those who would betray Him, abandon Him, and deny that they even knew Him.

It says in John 15:16a "You did not choose Me, but I chose you……

Do you realize that Jesus has chosen to be in a relationship with us?

When I was a kid is school I remember there were popular kids and I wanted to be their friend. But my choice to be their friend didn’t matter because they ignored me. It seemed the harder I worked to gain their acceptance the more they rejected me. It just made matters worse because they didn’t choose me because I wasn’t up to their standards, what ever they were.

The amazing thing is that Jesus the perfect Son of God chooses people like us. Look at vs. 29 and vs. 31 and notice Peter’s and the other disciple’s promises (FYI Judas was already gone). Promises that Jesus knew would soon be broken. That reminds me of me. I know I’ve made lots of promises to Jesus and His Dad. Some of them I intended to keep and some of them I made just to get out of whatever hot water I was in at the time. I don’t think I’ve kept any of them completely and you know what? Jesus knew I couldn’t and wouldn’t keep them and that I was lying through my teeth on some of them and the incredible truth is that Jesus still chooses to call me His friend and disciple and He invites me to come to His table and share this meal with Him.

Romans 8:1 [There is] therefore now no condemnation (judgment against you) to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

There is no condemnation because Jesus chose to be our friend and savior. He chose to shed His blood on the cross for us to forgive our sins and all He really asks in return is for us to be His friends and to follow Him. Like the first disciples it means we’ll have to leave our old life behind, but who needs that old sinful thing anyway when Jesus offers us His kingdom, His life, and His love.

Imagine how things would have turned out for Judas if he had chosen to stay at the table as Jesus’ friend that night. If there was a place at the table for a traitor like Judas there’s a place at the table for us and Jesus invites us to come.

This first step is to say yes to His offer to follow Him and leaving our sinful life behind. But there’s so much more as He invites us to His table as His friends to stay close to Him and share in His life.

It really doesn’t matter what you’ve done or how many promises you broken. If you’ve betrayed Him, denied Him, broken promises to Him He still invites you to come to the table as His friend.

Costly or Conveniently? - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this morning.

The last time we looked the ‘end times’ warning that Jesus gave His disciples in Mark 13. He warned them, and us, about 4 spiritual dangers that we will face as time draws to a close. They are Dependence on religious or political power for security. Deception by false messiahs, Distraction by world turmoil and being Discouraged by the severity of persecution. In addition to that He gave them the best promise of all He would return someday to establish His eternal kingdom on the earth and to right every wrong.

Today we’re going to look at Mark 14:1-11. Mark 14 is the turning point in the Passion Week story. We know that Jesus will be crucified by the end of this week and this chapter marks the final turn toward that moment in history.

Let’s read Mark 14:1-11

When I was reading over this passage there were two words that jumped out at me. The first word is costly. That’s the word in vs. 3 that is used to describe the oil that the woman, most likely Mary Magdalene, poured out on Jesus’ head.

The second word was conveniently found in vs. 11. That’s the word that is used to describe the actions Judas would take to betray Jesus.

This passage starts out in vs. 1-2 with a little back story about what was happening behind the scenes out of public view. The religious leaders had stopped trying to test and trap Jesus and now they were going full out to plot a way to kill Jesus without inciting a riot among the people. For them it wasn’t a matter of if, but when. Their minds were made up; Jesus was too much of a threat. They couldn’t ignore Him. They couldn’t defeat Him and they couldn’t discredit Him. It was clear to them that Jesus had to go when there was a convenient time.

In vs. 10 and 11 we see that they had an unexpected friend in Judas Iscariot, one of Jesus’ disciples. It appears that Jesus’ response to what Judas considered a waste of money by the woman who poured the costly oil on Jesus was the straw that broke the camel’s back and sent Judas off the edge.

He went to the chief priests and made a deal to turn Jesus over to them for some money. It might be just me, but doesn’t it seem that those who love money also love convenience? It’s almost as if one feeds the other. A desire for things that will make life more convenient and comfortable leads to a desire to have more money to get those things and what ends up happening is we get on a treadmill that we can’t seem to stop.

Both the chief priests and Judas were looking for a convenient way to get rid of Jesus. They wanted some way that would keep their actions and motives from being discovered. They didn’t care about the legality of what they were doing. They weren’t even concerned about the spiritual implications of their actions. All they cared about was making sure that they got rid of Jesus and that they looked like they were doing something good and righteous. They didn’t want to have to deal with a big mess.

It never ceases to amaze me the lengths we will go to try and cover up our sin. Why is that we work so hard to look good to people when what they think of us really doesn’t matter when it comes to things eternal.

We need to keep that in mind. What they didn’t realize and we need to remember is that…

Convenience in Spiritual things usually looks good on the surface but in the end it costs more than you bargained for.

Let’s be honest don’t we fall into this trap? When we know what the Bible says we should do but we do something else aren’t we taking what seems to be the convenient, easy way out? We all do it. We make excuses and rationalize our sin when we should repent of them. That’s the convenient thing to do, but we fail to consider the true cost. If I read my Bible correctly that convenience will only lead to pain and alienation from God and others. That’s not a good trade if you ask me.

Now let’s turn our attention to vs. 3-9. Jesus is sharing a meal with His disciples and the family of Simon the leper when a woman comes in with a very costly flask of oil. It was a fragrant perfume that probably cost her a year’s wages. How she got that much money isn’t known but there were very limited options for a woman in those days which has led some to suggest she was a woman who sold herself to others.

Jesus is sitting at the table of a man who is possibly an unclean leper, and having His hair soaked in perfume by a woman who was possibly a sinner. Now there’s a picture for you. The convenient thing for Jesus to do was to stay somewhere else and tell the woman to leave. The costly thing was to do what He was doing and risk the hits to His reputation. But this was only one aspect of this costly situation.

If we didn’t know what was coming later in this passage we might be inclined to agree with the disciples about this whole scene. On the surface it looks wasteful and strange and Jesus allowing it and even defending it would have seemed awkward. I mean how would you feel if some woman came in off the street while I was preaching and started washing my hair with perfume? I can assure you that I’d feel weird and not a little freaked out.

Jesus took it in stride because He knew that there was a deeper meaning to all of this and it was so important He made sure that what she did would be remembered forever.

What did it all mean? The woman’s actions were remembered for two reasons: In vs. 8. Jesus said that she had done what she could.

She gave a costly gift to Jesus simply because she could not because she had to. Her devotion to Jesus compelled her to offer what she could.

Remember the widow who put the two small coins in the treasury in ch.12? Jesus said she gave more than anyone else because she gave everything she had. Her ‘costly’ gift was only 2 small coins but she gave it because that’s what she could give. Giving one would have been more convenient and giving three was impossible. She gave what was costly. Jesus admires both of these women because they gave what they could.

Why did this woman’s gift impact Jesus like it did? The second part of vs. 8 says that she came to anoint His body for burial.

Her costly gift was a symbol of Jesus’ costly sacrifice. She broke the alabaster container symbolizing how the body of Jesus would be broken by the cruelty and beatings He would endure. She poured out the perfume symbolizing His blood that would be poured out for our sins as He would be nailed to a cross and pierced with a Roman spear.

It’s interesting to note that those who thought it was a waste were the same ones who thought His crucifixion was a waste. There was no way that any of them could have known the powerful witness her actions would provide or even how they would have a ripple effect on the heart of Judas to betray Jesus.

The woman (and the widow) offered what was costly to them because they could and they weren’t concerned about what they would have left over.

The priests and Judas wanted to get rid of Jesus conveniently because they were worried about what they would have left. The priests their reputation and position and Judas the money he would have when he was done with Jesus.

When we’re more concerned with what we’ll have left we miss out on what could have been. We trade our opportunities for convenience when we could offer what is costly to Jesus. While they may not have much value in the eyes of the world….

When we offer our costly things to Jesus (our time, our talents and our treasures) we bless His heart and they become tools in His hands to touch people beyond ourselves.

Fair Warning - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this year.

The last time we looked at three themes from Mark 12. Jesus established the guilt of the religious leaders for allowing Israel to fall away from God, then we looked at how Jesus disarmed the traps of the religious leaders and finally we took a look at the danger of reliance on the external signs of success and religion to justify ourselves.

Today we’re going to look at Mark chapter 13 which in the last 40 years or so has become one of the most controversial, and at least in my opinion, one of the most misused passages of scripture in the Bible.

How many of you were active believers in the 70’s and early 80’s? What was the most talked about topic during those years? There was a surge in Charismatic ideas and the health and wealth gospel but both of those were tied to the end times narrative. I can remember ‘rapture drills’ that feeling of fear when you thought the rapture happened and you were left behind. Songs, movies and so many other things convinced us that we were in the last days.

It was at that time that this passage and others became front and center in preaching and teaching. The problem was that they were often used without considering their context and they were often used to support the particular belief or bias of the teacher.

This morning I’m going to attempt to share this passage without allowing my particular bias about the end times influence how we look at it. Of course since I’m not a machine some of my bias will get in there but we’ll give it a go.

Even today there is curiosity about when the ‘end of days’ will come. In 1988 there was a book called “88 Reasons the Lord will Return in 1988” then of course we all remember the Y2K scare.

Now apparently we have a good date to work with thanks to the Mayan calendar. We now know the world will end in 2012, the only question I have about that is if the Mayan’s were so good at predicting the future how come they disappeared? Why didn’t they see that coming?

So here’s what we know: The world will end in 2012, prince Charles is the anti-Christ, and Ronald McDonald is the false prophet. What? You didn’t know that last one? OK so none of these things are true, but one thing we know for sure is that someone is going to get the date right at some point because at the beginning of each year someone will predict its this year.

Enough of that, let’s get to the Scripture.

Let’s read the first section Mark 13:1-37….

Let get something out of the way right now: Jesus was not trying to predict, set a date, or even give a specific list of things that would tell us when the ‘end’ would come. I think vs. 32 makes that clear.

So the question we have to consider is ‘Why did Jesus say this?’ What was the point?

If you look at what is happening here Jesus is going to be crucified in a couple of days and His disciples won’t have His continued physical presence to guide them. In fact they will have to rely on a new ‘Helper,’ the Holy Spirit to guide them (vs. 11) and it will take them some time to get used to this new way of doing things. Add to this that people have an addiction to their own flesh which fights against the Spirit and life can get very confusing sometimes. Jesus knew what they were facing and He takes this time to give them some warnings about what to watch for in the future.

But this passage is interesting in another way because it’s clear that Jesus is speaking to a larger future audience than just this group of 12 disciples. He’s speaking to His disciples of all ages to come because He knew that we would all face scary and confusing times and the things mentioned in this passage would be true of every age to come.

With this in mind I believe Jesus is giving His disciples fair warning of 4 spiritual dangers:

Dependence on religious or political power for security. Both are man made attempts to create security. The Jerusalem temple represented both of those things to the people. The other name for the temple was ‘Herod’s Temple’ because he was the one who used his political skill to gain permission from Rome to build the temple for the people to use in worship. It was a symbol of the merging of religious and political power.

Jesus warns the disciples that this temple and all it represents will be torn down and destroyed leaving all of those who look at it for their hope devastated, crushed and without hope.

This warning is just as important today. If our faith is placed in anything or anyone but Jesus we are in trouble.

Deception by false messiahs. False messiah’s have been around for 2,000 years. Paul encounters a false Messiah named ‘Bar-Jesus’ on His first missionary journey and that was only 20 or so years after Jesus ascended to Heaven. Today we have cults all over the world who claim to have a new revelation or a new way deceiving many, even some that were followers of Jesus. Be careful who you listen to and make sure they are teaching and living the Bible. They won’t be perfect but they will be honest, accountable, and humble.

You need to consider carefully what the teachers you follow are saying in the light of Scripture. Keep in mind there will always be some differences of opinion about some things but a trustworthy teacher will never claim that their ‘truth’ is above question.

Distraction by world turmoil. This week in Haiti, and for that matter these past 8-9 years we’ve experienced some of the most traumatic events we’ve ever seen. Unless you consider the Great Depression, the Dark Ages and black death that wiped out almost ½ the population of Europe, 2 world wars and the Holocaust, the Civil War and slave trade, etc. etc. The point isn’t to dismiss or diminish the tragic and turbulent times we’re in now but to show that there will always be tragic and turbulent events in the world that can either distract and consume us or help us to focus on being salt and light in dark times.

Discouraged by the severity of persecution. In America by the grace of God we’ve been spared persecution for our faith. The thing we fear the most in America is people making fun of us or being disrespected. But there are places in our world where people face real persecution, and even death for their faith.

Again we aren’t dismissing the possibility that things will get worse and more widespread, but persecution of Jesus’ followers has been around since Jesus came. In fact the first persecution was when Herod murdered the infants in Bethlehem trying to kill Jesus.

The early church believed they were living in the last days. The apostles all lived and taught that Jesus’ return was immanent and they based that belief on what Jesus had warned them about. The apostles continued to remind the church not to hide in fear or get caught up in the distractions and the deceptions of their day.

This created a sense of urgency and gave them a laser-like focus on taking the gospel to the ends of the earth and serving the sick and poor in their communities.

Jesus promised 2 things in this passage: The world won’t get better and Jesus will return. His return could be today it could be in 2012. No one knows the hour or the day and the Church, the followers of Jesus have a choice to make. Will we be absorbed in self pity and self protection because we fear the future OR will we be compelled to follow Jesus into the harvest fields of hurting, abused, and troubled people?

We have no excuse to be afraid or caught by surprise because Jesus has given us fair warning about what to expect but He also gave us this promise:

Vs. 26….. they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory.. 

What Do You Know? - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this week.

The last time we looked at Jesus’ confrontation with the religious leaders over who had real authority and we compared that to our struggles with Jesus’ authority in our life.

Today we’re going to look at Mark chapter 12 together as a group. As I was looking this over I had a hard time breaking it into sections so we’re going to take it all together.

From our past weeks we know that this event takes place during Jesus last week before His crucifixion. Up to this point Jesus had tried to steer clear of confrontations with the religious leaders, but now He has entered Jerusalem and is pushing the leaders to do something about Him.

Jesus had exposed their hypocrisy and established His authority and now in chapter 12 He’s exposing their self serving interpretations of the scriptures and their impure motives.

In this chapter Jesus sets up the confrontation with a parable that challenges and exposes the corruption of the religious leaders which provokes the Pharisees, the Sadducees and the Scribes to try and entrap Him.

Let’s read the first section Mark 12:1-12….

This parable is based on Isaiah 5:1-7 which portrays Israel as God’s vineyard. One of the interesting images from Isaiah is of God’s desire for a fruitful vine, but the vineyard produces wild vines instead and God promises to clean it out.

In using this parable Jesus is saying to the religious leaders that they are guilty of allowing the vineyard to become unfruitful because they wouldn’t listen to the word of God sent through the prophets and they actually persecuted them because they wanted to be in control. Jesus was also saying that they were even more guilty than the previous generations because they are about to kill the Son of God.

But Jesus is also telling them that His actions are the start of God’s judgment on them and Israel. He has come to start the vineyard cleaning work and He’s starting in the temple which represents the heart of their religious life. When they crucified Jesus they set in motion the very thing that is mentioned in vs. 9. They intended to remove Jesus but they actually removed themselves and opened the door of God’s vineyard to the gentiles, people like us.

As a side note I thought it was interesting that the OT was written for the people of Israel and the last word’s that God spoke to them are through the prophet Malachi 4:5-6 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD. 6 And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse."

Then God goes silent until the Apostle Paul comes along and is inspired to write the letters to the churches. Up to this point God had communicated to Israel, now God communicates to the church and the church to the world.

We are the fulfillment of verse 9! So turn to your neighbor and say “It’s nice to meet a fulfillment of a prophecy.”

As you can imagine the leaders weren’t very happy with this and they were even more angry when Jesus asks them if they even read the scriptures (they were after all the teachers and interpreters of the scriptures). While there is probably some plotting going on behind the scenes the religious leaders feel forced to entrap and silence Jesus because they sense the people beginning to move toward Jesus.

In vs. 13-17 the Pharisees try to trip Him up with a political trap about taxes. The Herodians represented the political lobbyists who were helping the Pharisees trap Jesus. If Jesus says taxes are not to be paid then they could turn Him in to the Romans. If Jesus said that taxes were to be paid the people would reject Him as a Roman puppet. But Jesus doesn’t allow Himself to be pulled into this political argument.

In vs. 18-27 the Sadducees try to tangle Jesus in a theological trap. The question they ask Him isn’t a major issue of concern to them, they just want to force Jesus into an endless no win discussion. If you’ve ever been in one of those you know how frustrating it can be. The Sadducees believed that the 5 books of Moses (Gen. Ex. Lev. Num. Deut.) were the only true Scriptures so if Jesus was going to turn this around He would have to use the Scriptures they accepted. Jesus uses Exodus 3:6 to prove that they were mistaken and discredits them.

In vs. 28-34 a Scribe is next and asks Jesus a question of interpretation. It’s not clear if this Scribe is genuine or trying to trap Jesus, but even if He is honest those listening would use Jesus’ answer against Him. Jesus again uses Scriptures from the 5 books of Moses that everyone accepted and answers wisely.

Jesus gives us the example for responding to challenges to our faith that we have to deal with.

First we have to be led by the Spirit because if we lean on our own understanding we’ll get tangled up in a mess that will end in nothing good. John 14:26 "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.”

Second, we have to be wise about the challenges we take on because if we enter those kinds of endless winless arguments we’ll be distracted and led away from the things we should be focused on. Titus 3:9 But avoid foolish disputes, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and useless.

Third, we need to know the Word of God. In each situation Jesus used Scripture to disarm the traps. 2 Timothy 3:16 All Scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,

Finally Jesus draws a comparison that we need to pay attention too. In vs. 35-44 Jesus reveals that the Scribes who look very spiritual and all religious are actually just hiding the corruption that’s really in their heart. There’s a key phrase I want you to see in vs. 40 that connects it to the story of the widow’s two mites. It says they devour widow’s houses. They take from them to line their own pockets and could care less about what happens to them.

Then as Jesus is watching the hypocritical show of the offerings in the treasury when one of the very widows who the Scribes have devoured comes in and gives an offering of what she has left and Jesus points out the purity of her actions. What she did was far more than give and offering, she was in that act of giving surrendering herself into the care of her God.

The phony hypocrites were all about what they had left for themselves and the widow was all about Who she had left.

Are we more concerned with what we have or Who we have?

Who's In Charge Here? - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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Watch live streaming video from columbialifechurchtv at livestream.com

We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this year.

The last time we looked at the significance of the events surrounding the time when Jesus cursed the fig tree and threw the merchants out of the temple. What they showed us was that in each situation the way things appeared on the surface were at odds with what was really going on deep inside.

For us it’s a warning not to allow ourselves to become satisfied with surface “religious” appearances when Jesus is much more interested in a deeper personal relationship with us and He desires us to have honest, accountable fellowship with each other and when we wear that mask of religious ‘goodness’ we prevent that from happening.

The challenge for us is to be honest with God and each other, tear off our masks and be genuine followers of Jesus without pretense and prejudice.

This morning we pick up the story of Jesus’ final week as He returns to Jerusalem and I walking in the temple after having gone in and turned over the tables and open the animal pens.

What that shows me is that He was definitely trying to provoke a response from the Priests and elders. It also shows that He assumed the authority to do what He did.

Today’s confrontation is all about who’s in charge. If Jesus is allowed to continue unchallenged then the religious leaders knew their authority would be undermined and they would be out of power. Jesus knew their dilemma and was pushing their buttons and forcing them into a confrontation.

But Jesus didn’t stop with the religious leaders of His day. He continues this part of His ministry today. Through the Holy Spirit we’re asked ‘Who’s in charge around here?”

Let’s read Mark 11:27-33….

Jesus and His disciples are walking through the temple and they are approached by the Jewish religious leaders. Mark says they were the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders. I thought it was interesting that it doesn’t specifically mention the Pharisees. The term elders must then include representatives of both the Pharisees and the Sadducees.

The Pharisees and Sadducees made up the Sanhedrin, which were the rulers of the religious establishment. The interesting thing here is that these two groups didn’t get along, kind of like Democrats and Republicans. They didn’t get along, that is, until they faced what they considered a common threat.

To them Jesus was a threat to their authority so His presence in the temple would require them to respond. They couldn’t just let this rustic ‘rabbi’ from some outlying province come in and take over so they had to challenge His authority. That’s why they asked Him the two questions they did.

By asking who’s authority was behind His actions they were trying to minimize and label Him. If Jesus was operating with secular authority from the Romans they could appeal to Pilate to have Him stopped and labeling Him a Roman sympathizer would undermine Him before the people. If Jesus were the disciple of some radical rabbi then they could label Him a heretic or radical and use that to dismiss Him as just another in a long line of pretenders. And if Jesus is the disciple of a duly recognized rabbi then they could have His rabbi talk to him and settle Him down. In essence their asking Him “Who do you think you are?”

But Jesus answers them in a way that forces a very unexpected response. Instead of provoking Jesus into an argument that would distract Him, they were forced to ‘reason among themselves.’ They reasoned that the tables had been turned and now Jesus held the upper hand. If they were to say that John’s baptism was from God then they would be exposed as hypocrites because they were against John. If they said John’s baptism was his own idea then the people would reject them because the people believed that John was a prophet.

What they had was a gift and they didn’t want it. Jesus was giving them an opportunity to come clean, to quit hiding behind their religious masks and return to God, but the leaders allowed their fear of exposure, their fear of the opinions of people to build an even higher wall to hide behind and Jesus lets them go.

It’s easy for us to look at this story and take great pleasure in how Jesus put these guys in their place. We know that Jesus is really in charge and these guys just didn’t get it or didn’t want to admit it.

Of course if we turn the camera around and put ourselves in this story where would we be standing? While I can’t speak for everyone I know that there are a plenty of us who would be standing alongside the religious leaders. The difference is that we’ve been at this a long time and we don’t directly question Jesus or ask ‘Who He thinks He is?” but… We tend to be a little spiritually hard of hearing.

Deep down we know what He’s asking but we don’t want to surrender to His authority in our life. We like calling the shots for ourselves yet we don’t want to be label as rebellious. So instead of saying ‘We don’t know” like the religious leaders we spiritually plug our ears and say “We can’t hear You.” Somehow we think that fake ignorance will be judged less harshly than rebellion. But it’s the same thing and until we’re ready to confront our fears and answer Jesus honestly He’ll give us room to decide.

What are we afraid of? Sometimes we’re afraid of what other people will think. We don’t want to be considered religious fanatics or weirdoes. Sometimes we fear losing control because if we surrender to His authority we’ll have to give up our control to Him. Sometimes we fear giving up the things we’re attached to and like. We’re comfortable with the way things are and we don’t want to change.

The enemy will use our fear against us just like He used it against the religious leaders. He’s the master of lies and deceit and he uses our fears of loss of control to control us and keep us resistant to Jesus’ authority. When we think we have control we’re deceived and don’t realize that we’re under the control of our sin nature which resists the authority of God in our life.

That leaves us to face this question: Who’s really in charge of our life?

If it’s anyone but Jesus we’re in trouble. The disciples could do anything with Jesus’ authority in their life and they could do nothing without it. If you’re feeling like you’re on a treadmill going nowhere spiritually you might want to ask your self “Who’s really in charge?”

The way to Spiritual maturity and freedom is to surrender to Jesus. That’s counter-intuitive and goes against our natural grain. We want to take more control, to do more but it’s clear that surrendering to Jesus authority is the way we should go.

Things Aren't What They Seem - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this morning. 

The last time we looked at the Triumphal Entry but specifically the evening that Jesus went into the temple to look around and how that parallels how He enters and looks around in our life.

This morning we pick up the story of Jesus’ final week as He returns to Jerusalem.

The theme that stood out to me for this passage was how things weren’t what they seemed to be.

Jesus wasn’t who He seemed to be, the fig tree wasn’t what it seemed to be, the activities in the temple weren’t what they seemed to be, and prayer wasn’t what it seemed to be.

So let’s read Mark 11:12-26….

The first thing I noticed was that Jesus wasn’t acting like a Messiah should act. He was coming in peace, but then all of a sudden He takes up this violent attack on the merchants in the temple. Can you imagine what His disciples were thinking? They probably didn’t know what to do. Should they stop Him or join Him? They’d never seen this side of Jesus and they had to wonder what had gotten into Him. It certainly wasn’t what they expected.

He turned over their money tables, and set the animals free, and Mark adds that He even made the people who used the temple courts for a short cut stop.

But Jesus’ words give us a clue to why He did this. First He said “My house…” He didn’t say God’s house – This is a quote from Isaiah and Jesus is taking action as if He owns the place. In fact He does own the place because He is God! So in this statement He’s showing His authority as Messiah and God. The rest of the quote says that this place is a house of prayer, communion with God but they had turned it into a den of thieves.

The problem wasn’t that they were selling sacrificial animals. That was necessary for the pilgrims who had traveled several miles to get there. It would be difficult to bring an animal that far so having sacrificial animals was helpful. But these merchants were selling imperfect animals and cheating people on the exchange rate for their out of town currency and an even bigger problem was the priests who should have kept this from happening were profiting off of this themselves probably from kick backs or fees for booth space.

Either way it was a huge violation of the temple and a sign of the corrupt core of the religious leaders.

Then we come to the whole fig tree thing. Anyone else ever wonder what that was all about? I mean the whole cursing the tree because it didn’t have any figs is kind of strange. One thing this passage show is Jesus humanness. He was hungry, frustrated, angry, and He cursed a fig tree.

Doesn’t that sound so like us? How many times have you been hungry, cranky, and got mad at an inanimate object and yell at it like it could even hear. The interesting thing about this is that the fig tree incident reveals Jesus divine power. His curse actually caused the tree to wither and die.

Do you ever wonder why Jesus got mad at the tree because it didn’t figs even though He knew it wasn’t the time figs? Well the best explanation I’ve heard is that it wasn’t the season for leaves either. So if this tree had leaves it should have had figs and since it didn’t it was a hypocrite and served as an object lesson for the religious leaders of Israel who had the ‘leaves’ to look like they had the truth, but inside there wasn’t anything of value.

But even at this there’s something else that’s odd about this encounter. When Peter notices the dead tree he points it out to Jesus and you’d expect Jesus to explain the tree is a symbol of the religious leaders of Israel, etc. But instead He goes into a lesson about faith and that with faith the disciples could kill trees or even cast mountains into the sea. What? Didn’t see that one coming did we?

Now if the tree was to be a symbol of the religious leadership wouldn’t Jesus have said that? Maybe, maybe not, because He seemed to confuse His disciples a lot but I have an additional thought about this. The OT law (Deut. 21:23) said that anyone who was hanged on tree was cursed. By the end of this week Jesus will have been hanged on a tree becoming a curse for us and could it just be possible that the mountain He’s talking about is the mountain of sin that separated us from God that would be removed by faith in His power to reverse the curse that the tree represented?

Turn with me to Gal. 3:5-14 and look at how it seems to affirm this idea.

It all ends with vs. 24-26 and a quick lesson on prayer. Normally we place vs. 24 separate from vs. 25-26 but I think these verses go together. You may ask what you want but if your heart isn’t right with your neighbor it’s not right with God and your prayers won’t be answered. But there’s something else to consider, not will an unforgiving heart hinder your prayers it will prevent your forgiveness.

Do you get the idea here that God takes this forgiving each other thing pretty seriously? With so many other ‘worse’ sins why would He throw down on this? What’s the harm in a holding a little grudge here and there, it’s not that big a deal, right? I mean everyone does it so it can’t be that bad.

Well let’s look at those verses again. Nope, don’t see any loopholes. So if you’re holding a grudge or unforgiveness in your heart toward someone then you need to take care of it so God can move on with you.

When we boil it all down…

Faith is the one constant that we need when things aren’t what they seem. I think if anything Jesus was saying to them and to us that this world is a crazy place and not everything will go as you expect it to but if you have faith in God you’ll find the source of hope you need to transcend the confusion and enter into His rest.

There are three empty things that make our faith full:

The empty manger
The empty cross
The empty tomb

Jesus didn't stay little and He didn't stay dead.  He was born to die so that we could have life.

Taking a Look Around - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this morning.

The last time we looked at how the hardness of our hearts can cause deep divisions in families and relationships. Some examples that Jesus discussed were divorce and missing out on entering the kingdom of God.

Mark 11 begins the phase in Jesus’ ministry known as the ‘Holy Week’ the last week before the crucifixion. Every phase of Jesus’ ministry was pointed toward this moment. It’s the culmination of the reason He came to the earth as a baby and took on human flesh. All four gospels record this last week in great detail. 1/3 of the gospel of Mark is devoted to this last week of His life.

Chapter 11 begins with the Triumphal Entry.

So let’s read Mark 11:1-11….

Jesus had been to Jerusalem at least 7 times that we know of from scripture. But this return is very different. This time Jesus is intentionally going to stir things up in Jerusalem. He’s forcing the hand of the religious and political leaders to do something about Him. The way He went about it was not through violent opposition or military invasion. He came as the Prince of Peace.

There always comes a point when Jesus places Himself in the way so that we have to respond to Him.

In Zechariah 9:9-10 "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He [is] just and having salvation, Lowly and riding on a donkey, A colt, the foal of a donkey. 10 I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim And the horse from Jerusalem; The battle bow shall be cut off. He shall speak peace to the nations; His dominion [shall be] ‘from sea to sea, And from the River to the ends of the earth.’

Jesus was clearly entering Jerusalem to fulfill this prophecy and Luke’s gospel account tells us that this entry into Jerusalem caught the attention of the Pharisee’s and they wanted Jesus to rebuke the people who were praising Him. They knew the scriptures and they understood what Jesus was doing and they knew Jesus knew it too and when He refused to stop the people it was a big deal because Jesus was claiming to be the Messiah by His actions. This event set in motion everything that was going to happen in the week that followed.

This moment had to have been awe inspiring as the people rose up in spontaneous praise and offering their clothing down and spreading palm branches for the colt to walk on euphoric at the sight of their Messiah entering Jerusalem.

Something else was different about this event. In the past Jesus always left when the crowds started to gather and He avoided situations like this. Remember how often He told people not to tell anyone what He had done for them so that He wouldn’t draw an extra attention. That’s all changed now.

There is another scene in this story that caught my attention. In vs. 11 Mark tells us that in the late night hour Jesus went into the temple to look around. The temple would have been quiet and still with all of the day’s activities done for the day. He most likely would have seen the empty stalls of the merchants and money changers with some animals caged and ready to be sold to the people for use as sacrifices.

It makes me wonder what Jesus was thinking about. He had been coming to this temple every year to worship at the Passover. Can you picture Him walking those corridors and pondering the stories His mother had told Him about how the Prophet Simeon and the Prophetess Anna both recognized Him as the Messiah. I wonder if He thought about words of Simeon that a sword would pierce her soul and how that would be fulfilled by the end of the week as His mother experienced the agony of watching her son being beaten and crucified.

I wonder if He went by the place where He and amazed the teachers when He was just a boy and recalled the worried looks on Mary and Joseph’s face when they found Him there after leaving Him behind for three days.

He might have looked up at the pinnacle of the temple and thought about the last temptation when Satan tried to get Him to throw Himself down from the temple so that the angels could rescue Him. Jesus resisted and the devil left but He knew that He would face Him again. Would it be here again?

I wonder if He went to the place where He had cried out that thirsty souls who would come to Him would have rivers of living water pouring from their hearts.

In some ways this moment reminds me of another man who returned to a place full of memories and spent some time there meeting with God. Jacob had seen many hard years and He returned to Beth-El where He had met with God years before.

Could it be that Jesus was soaking in this moment knowing it would be the last time He would be in this temple in peace before His death?

In all of this there is a parallel to our lives. We all experience great joy when we find the Messiah for ourselves. We remember that day, that moment like it’s seared into our memory in vivid detail. We celebrated with joy and sharing the moment with others rejoicing because Jesus has entered our life.

But in time there comes a point when things calm down and Jesus takes a look around in the temple of our hearts.

What does Jesus find as He walks the corridors of the temple of your life? In our time with Him we can remember moments of joy and trials of pain. He looks at the things we’ve tried to hide in the corners where no one can see them. We know they’re there but if others knew about them it would be embarrassing to us.
As He considers the things in our life what will He discover that we’ve traded away for cheap substitutes instead of the fullness of His presence?

Will He recall moments of joy with you spent in the harvest fields working together?

What does He see in your life when He looks around?

Will He find a heart that’s willing to endure the cross for the joy that is set before us?